


Cicatricem

by kmo



Category: Hannibal (TV), The Wire
Genre: Backstory, F/M, Pre-Series, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-04
Updated: 2015-03-04
Packaged: 2018-03-16 06:59:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3478748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kmo/pseuds/kmo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the aftermath of her attack, Bedelia takes responsibility for her own life. But not without consequences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cicatricem

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MamaMystique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MamaMystique/gifts).



> From the tumblr prompt "cicactricem-scar" from MamaMystique- this is a tale that really grew in the telling but I wanted to do it justice. Also thanks to the TheGirlinNumber9 who encouraged me to write my version of Bedelia's attack. 
> 
> Kima Greggs makes a small cameo appearance, so it's not a true _Wire_ crossover. I would love, love, love a Wire/Hannibal crossover! Just putting that out there.

So ding dong   
There's the doorbell   
Hello man in red   
He's gonna make you all well   
Getcha into bed   
But hey now  
You don't feel better   
As you wake and slowly rise   
Maybe this smooth jet-setter lied 

\--[Nellie McKay, "Ding Dong"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPieigcwXxI)

 

 

Her diplomas from Yale College and Harvard Med hang askew, frames shattered, her pedigree smashed to pieces. Shards of glass litter her desk and floor from snowflake-sized bits to larger pointed icicles, making it seem as if an ice storm has barreled its way through Bedelia’s downtown office. Small flecks of red dot the fibers of her now ruined dove grey carpet, giving it a chilling ombre. Bedelia herself kneels at the center of it beside the body of Miguel Rojas, his face more peaceful in death than it ever was in his short but troubled life.

“It will go easier for you if Mr. Rojas’ death appears natural,” a dark voice, Hannibal’s voice, says.

“It was self-defense. He was going to kill me.”

“You cut out his tongue.”

She is far away, an ocean away from here. Not ten minutes prior Miguel had chased her around her office, calling her the most obscene names and vowing that if he could not have her, he would end her. Her own blood had pounded hot and fast in her veins. She killed him, she must have. Alive, dead. Dead, alive. Miguel’s life snuffed out like a light, her hand on the switch.

“We must give the police the story they wish to believe. The simpler, the more familiar, the better,” Hannibal says, his words travelling slowly toward her, as if the very air was filled with molasses instead of oxygen.

She remembers him coming to her rescue, a moment too late. He was surprised—and perhaps disappointed—to find she had subdued the monster on her own, but gallantly only let it show a second before sweeping into action to help her cover up the crime. Hannibal stood in front of her now, human veil pulled back to reveal the slick sinuous body of the predator she had always suspected was underneath. Why does she have the feeling he has done this sort of thing before?

“Petite, frail psychiatrist attacked and overpowered by her aggressive and psychotic patient. That kind of story?” she asks, half-dead herself.

“It is not a lie, save for the fact that you were not overpowered.” Hannibal crosses across the room to pull down the blinds. It is night, well after hours, but he is cautious. He frowns. “It would be more convincing if your person reflected more signs of…damage.”

Bedelia looks herself over. There is hardly a scratch on her, save for the livid purple bruise on her knee where she banged it against her mahogany coffee table while trying to outrun Miguel. The cuffs on her silk blouse are stained with blood, turning the fabric from cerise to vermillion.

Hannibal offers her his hand and she rises coltishly to her feet. He guides her to her damask sofa, the only area of the room untouched. She sits and he slides down beside her.

“You are going to have to trust me,” he says. It is not a question.

Bedelia nods and Hannibal places his hand on her good knee. His fingernails claw at her stockings, ripping the silk to shreds. His hand travels under her skirt, up to her thigh, where his fingertips press into her flesh, hard enough to bruise.

He rips at the garter and her eyes fly open wide to glare at him. “How many liberties do you intend to take in the name of verisimilitude?” she asks.

He removes his hand from her leg. “You look appropriately ravished.”

“I should say.”

“I’m not finished yet.”

Hannibal reaches down near the floor and picks up a shard of glass from the shattered frame of her diploma nearly identical to the one she had used to sever the frenulum on her patient’s tongue. “Hold out your hands.”

“You intend to cut me.”

“Superficial cuts. Defensive wounds.”

Bedelia raises her hands, palms forward. Hannibal does not count down or console her with false promises that his mutilation will not hurt. He swipes at her hands with the glass surgically and professionally. She bites her lip to keep from crying out. The blood trickles slowly at first, but within minutes her hands are a ravaged mess.

Hannibal wraps his arm around her shoulder and pulls her to his chest. With his free hand, he unbuttons her blouse to her breast bone, exposing a wide swath of unblemished skin. He lifts her hair out of the way with great reverence. “I will warn you, this will be painful. But it will be quick and precise and if it is seen to swiftly enough, it should not scar.”

“Get on with it then,” she says through gritted teeth.

Hannibal strokes her hair, and places a chaste kiss on her temple. She can feel his hot breath against her. His embrace is both tender and horrifying. The moment before he cuts her she swears his irises shift from warm brown to bloody maroon, filled with a feral pleasure more inhuman than anything poor dead Miguel ever showed her in his rages.

But Hannibal in his delight has cut her too deep. Blood splashes down her neck, runs beneath her bra, giving her a ghastly décolleté. It’s too much, too quick. The last thing she hears before unconsciousness takes her is Hannibal’s smooth baritone calling for an ambulance.

*****

When she wakes, it is in the impersonal embrace of a young paramedic, the wool of a shock blanket warm and stiff against her skin. The woman applies pressure to her neck, while an older bearded man flashes lights in her eyes to check for a concussion. Her hands are wrapped and swaddled in clean white gauze.

The female paramedic hands her a box of apple juice while her colleague starts an IV in her left arm full of clear liquid. She must have fainted from the shock, not loss of blood. “You’re going to be fine, Dr. Du Maurier. You’re lucky your husband found you when he did,” she says.

“He’s not my husband,” Bedelia replies, speech slurred.

Her office, she notices, is now a flurry of activity. Two detectives, a man and a woman, both in ill-fitting suits, are talking to Hannibal. Pops of a flashbulb erupt near Miguel’s corpse, too brightly for her eyes. Hannibal notices she is awake and guides the female detective over to where she sits.

The woman mouths words, but they are garbled, like they are being spoken from deep underwater in a language Bedelia doesn’t understand. The detective appeals to Hannibal.

He bends beside her and drapes his arm around her shoulders, stroking up and down, as one would soothe a frightened animal. “The detectives wish to know if you would like them to perform a rape kit.”

Too stunned for words, Bedelia merely shakes her head. “That won’t be necessary.”

“Are you sure?” the detective asks, gently prodding, eyes travelling over Bedelia’s bruised legs and torn stockings.

“Quite.”

“Dr. Lecter has given us his version of events. At approximately 6:30 PM this he received a voice message from Miguel Rojas on his office line in which he announced his intentions to murder you this evening. Had Rojas ever threatened you before?”

Bedelia swallows. “He had certain outbursts of temper. A history of mania and paranoia. But threatened to kill me? No.” It is the truth.

“And what happened tonight?”

“He had rescheduled our session for late in the evening. When he came into my office he announced his intention to kill me because I had rejected his repeated romantic advances. He attacked me.” Bedelia closes her eyes and presses her bandaged hands against her neck. “He would have killed me had he not had a seizure.”

“Certain antipsychotic medications carry a risk of seizure. Especially if he was taking them in incorrect quantities or mixing them with street drugs, as Mr. Rojas had a tendency to do,” Hannibal offers, unsolicited.

The detective nods and jots this down on her notepad. She hands Bedelia a white business card with her name and title embossed with the logo of the Baltimore Police Department.  _Detective Kima Greggs, Homicide_ , it reads. “I know you’ve been through a lot, Dr. Du Maurier. I’m going to let the paramedics finish up with you and I’ll call you in a few days to make a formal statement. Our lab tech is going to take some pictures of your wounds. And the crime lab is going to need your clothes.”

“Of course, Detective Greggs. I have some dry cleaning in my closet here. Anything I can do to help with your investigation.”

“It’s hardly a whodunit, Doctor. Rojas had a history of assault with women, his therapy was court-ordered after stalking an ex-girlfriend.” The detective’s voice is full of sisterly solidarity. “You are one lucky lady.”

“Yes, I am,” Bedelia replies with a brittle smile. Her eyes lock with Hannibal’s. They have told the police the story they wish to believe.

After Detective Greggs leaves, the paramedic returns. “The wound on your neck is deep and will need stitches. You want to ride in the bus with us to the Emergency Room or have…uh…your gentleman friend take you?” she asks, nodding her head in Hannibal’s direction.

Hannibal again smoothly inserts himself into the conversation. “I was a surgeon before I was a psychiatrist. I could sew you up here. It would save you a trip to the hospital. With your permission, of course, Dr. Du Maurier,”

She wants to protest, but her professional boundaries are heavy and Bedelia finds she no longer has the necessary strength to prop them up any longer. Wordlessly, she nods.

The paramedic raises an eyebrow, but dutifully hands over the stainless steel needle and antiseptic thread to Hannibal. Deft as a tailor, he threads the needle while the paramedic pulls back the bandage on her neck. Within minutes, he is finished. Hannibal has sewn her back together less than an hour after he ripped her open.

“You sure you don’t want to go to the ER and get checked out?” the female paramedic asks skeptically.

“I’m sure.”

“You got someone at home? Someone to call?”

Bedelia shakes her head. She’s more alone now than she’s ever been. “My sister lives in Chicago.”

The woman levels a steady gaze at Hannibal. “She shouldn’t be alone.”

Hannibal lays a hand, heavy and possessive, on Bedelia’s good shoulder. “She won’t be. I will see Dr. Du Maurier home.”

  
*****

Bedelia hands her clothes over to the forensics team and the keys to her silver Jaguar over to Hannibal. She sits in the passenger seat of her own car, half-stunned, nervy and oddly sleepy. A clinical voice within diagnoses her condition as Acute Stress Reaction, the body’s natural response to traumatic events. Only time will tell if it develops into full blown Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Hannibal takes a circuitous route back to her leafy suburban home, passing through some of Baltimore’s more unsavory neighborhoods. On an abandoned block of Edmondson Avenue, he pulls to the side, and parks the car with the engine running. He reaches inside the pocket of his grey plaid suit and retrieves a glass shard covered with blood: the crude makeshift scalpel she had used on Miguel. She opens the passenger door and drops the glass into a storm drain. They drive away, no witnesses but the rats and the pigeons.

*****

Her silk nightgown and matching robe are far too thin and Bedelia wishes she had something drab, high-necked, and flannel to wear instead. She feels her nipples harden in the cool air and crosses her arms over her chest to hide them from Hannibal’s curious eyes. “Why are you doing this?” she asks.

“Because I feel I am somehow responsible. I referred Miguel to you and put you in a dangerous situation. I thought a female therapist would help him resolve some of his issues toward women.” Hannibal hangs his head, chastened. “I was wrong…and my error nearly had fatal consequences for you.”

“They certainly had fatal consequences for Miguel Rojas.”

Hannibal’s eyes flick up, fervent, worshipful. “You are worth a thousand of him.”

“Don’t say that.”

“Why not? It is the truth. And obviously you must believe it or you would not have defended yourself so valiantly.”

Bedelia responds with stony silence. She walks into her ensuite bath and retrieves a sleeping pill from her medicine cabinet. She brushes her teeth, washes her face, moisturizes, and takes the pill with a small glass of water.

When she returns to her bedroom, Hannibal is there waiting for her, sitting on the edge of her bed removing his buttery Italian loafers. His grey plaid jacket is neatly folded and draped over the chair in front of her vanity. His intentions are well telegraphed.

“It is entirely inappropriate for you to be here, Hannibal.”

He pulls back the covers on her side of the bed. “Your condition needs to be monitored. Surely if there was ever a moment for relaxing professional boundaries, it is now.”

“You are my patient.”

“I am also a doctor.” He reclines on top of the soft, fluffy duvet and pats the empty space beside him. “You need to rest, Bedelia.”

Her head swims and she feels drowsy, the pill taking effect quicker than anticipated. Again she tries to summon the strength to resist him and fails. Her limbs are heavy, her eyes are tired, the bed too tempting, and Hannibal too persuasive.

She reluctantly climbs in beside him and pulls the duvet up to her chin. Hannibal takes her bandaged hand in his ostensibly to check her sluggish pulse. He does not relinquish it, intertwining his fingers with hers. Soft candlelit warmth spreads through her body from his touch. It shocks her how much she needs it, how cold she has been without it.

Her last thought before she falls asleep is that they are playing house. Though she cannot in this farce fathom if she is his wife or his broken porcelain doll.

*****

When Bedelia wakes, there is one brief moment of blissful ignorance before last night’s events and her role in them comes crashing down upon her with the weight of a 747 dropped out of the sky. The brightness of the room and the indentation in the mattress tell her both that Hannibal slept beside her and that he has already awoken. She wonders if he stayed there all night.

Mere moments after stirring, he is beside her, bearing a steaming hot breakfast on a silver tray that she had forgotten she even owned. There is oatmeal swirled with blueberries and cream, two perfectly poached eggs, toast, marmalade, and small juicy sausage links. Orange and lemon peels cut to look like roses garnish the plate along with a single snow white tulip in a vase. It’s like she went to sleep in a horror film and woke up at the Ritz-Carleton.

Hannibal sets the tray over her lap as she sits up. “I look the liberty of making you breakfast.” He pours one cup of coffee for her from the French press and a second for himself. “Cream and sugar?”

“Black, thank you.” The sharp aroma of the coffee cuts through the haze in her brain, the familiar ritual comforting and normal. “How did you find the pantry?”

“Adequate,” he says with a sniff. “There were a few choice ingredients lacking. The eggs I bought at today’s farmers’ market and the sausages I brought from my own larder.”

Bedelia smiles stiffly and cuts into her poached egg with the side of her fork. The egg yolk runs across the plate and suddenly it is not bright yellow yolk but thick red blood, Miguel’s blood. She drops the fork with a clatter and closes her eyes. When she opens them, the blood is gone. “I’m sorry…I’m not very hungry.”

Hannibal is firm, insistent. He places the fork back in her hand. “You must eat.”

Bedelia lays aside the fork and picks up the knife instead to spread marmalade about her toast. She takes a cautious bite. It is very good. “I’ve never had much of an appetite in the morning.”

“It’s afternoon. You slept nearly fifteen hours.”

She finishes her toast and pushes her plate aside.

Hannibal frowns at her, but she suspects he is more disappointed than worried. He takes food very seriously, especially his own. He removes the tray and sets it atop her dresser. He checks the bandages on her hands. She allows him to change them.

When he moves to change the one on her neck, she recoils and pulls her bathrobe close about her. “I’ll see to that one myself. If you’d excuse me, I’d like to take a bath.”

“Be mindful that you don’t overtax yourself.”

“Thank you for breakfast. If you put the rest in the refrigerator, I promise I’ll have some later.”

Mollified, Hannibal bears her tray away.

*****

Always a private person, but today even more so, Bedelia wishes for nothing more than to be left alone. She will sift and measure her feelings in her own time. She cannot do it with Hannibal hovering about. He has been solicitous and kind. Without his aid, there is a strong likelihood that she might have spent last evening in police custody instead of in her own luxurious bed. Her gratitude does not change the fact that he is taking too much pleasure playing doctor to her patient, this carnivalesque reversal of roles.

The only way to dismiss the doctor is to show him his patient has recovered. To that end, Bedelia bathes and washes her hair, taking the time to blow dry it smooth and straight. She applies moisturizer, foundation, rouge, shadow, mascara, lipstick, and powder. With some difficulty and not a little pain she pulls on a soft cashmere cardigan. Bedelia dons slacks and flats instead of pencil skirts and heels, but she emerges from her bedroom perfectly put together. Outside she appears elegant and refined, all the better to hide the cuts and bruises, to say nothing of the shattered psyche within.

She finds Hannibal in her kitchen reading the paper. “I don’t think you will have to worry about the police. Detective Greggs and her colleagues have a great deal on their plates. The city is in the midst of yet another drug war.” He points to the front page, above the fold. The headline reads  _FOUR DEAD IN EASTSIDE SHOOT OUT_. “I just got off the phone with your secretary. I instructed her to reschedule all your patients for the next two weeks and told her to give them my number if any were in serious distress.”

“You are very considerate and thoughtful Hannibal.” He smiles back at her, like a precocious schoolboy praised by his teacher. “Very helpful, too. But I am feeling much recovered and would appreciate some time on my own.”

His smile falls. “I cannot leave you like this.”

“You must,” she says. “Your assistance has been invaluable. Had you not been present last night, I am sure I would have acted…imprudently. But I have accepted too much assistance from you already.”

“Why?” he asks, wide-eyed and petulant.

“You know why.” She closes her eyes to avoid the temptation of rolling them. “You are my patient, Hannibal. To impose upon you…to accept what you give no matter how generously you give it…would be to harm you. You see our professional boundaries as a wall to be torn down. For me they are a container, into which I pour a measure of my affection for you.”

His dark eyes are opaque, impenetrable. She never knows if anything she says reaches the man-shaped creature beneath the human veil. “I merely wish to help.”

She touches him gently on the shoulder of his jacket. “I know. Right now you can help by giving me some time to myself. I spoke to my sister, she’ll be here by evening tonight. If she finds a man here…well, she will make certain assumptions.”

“I understand,” he says. Almost as an afterthought he produces a glass jar from inside his breast pocket. “A salve I made, for you. It should help with your cuts, to prevent scarring. Apply it twice daily.”

“Delving into the apothecary’s trade. What can’t you do?”

“I’ve always considered cooking to be a kind of medicine and vice versa. Please do not hesitate to call me if you need anything at all.”

The salve is rich and creamy. It smells of orange blossoms and sun-kissed gardens in Granada. But underneath it all, Bedelia still smells raw coppery blood and rotten flesh.

*****

It is a wonderful thing, Bedelia thinks, to lock the door, turn her cell phone to silent and ignore the world outside and all its worries. For three days, she barely leaves her bed. Her limbs feel leaden, her brain packed with cotton, and she has no other ambition than to crawl between her 600 thread count Egyptian cotton sheets and never emerge again. Bedelia knows these textbook symptoms of clinical depression should worry her, that she should seek out her own psychotherapist. But doctor-patient confidentiality or no, there is no one she can unburden herself to, save Hannibal perhaps, and he is not an option.

She lied when she told him her sister was on her way. Oh, she called Christabel eventually, rather than have it filter back to her second or third-hand from someone else. But her younger sister does not offer to fly in from Chicago and Bedelia does not ask her to come. Flighty and self-absorbed, Christabel has the attention span of a fruit fly and a nurturing instinct that rarely extends beyond her Oak Park manse. Two days later, Christabel sends her one of those elaborately tacky edible bouquets instead of herself. Bedelia tells herself the fresh fruit will aid her recovery more quickly than her sister would.

Three days after her attack, Detective Greggs comes to her house to take a formal statement. Before leaving, she informs Bedelia that the medical examiner has ruled Miguel Rojas died of natural causes due to complications with his medication. She has gotten away with murder. She doesn’t know whether to celebrate or cry.

For two days, there are television vans parked outside her house. Reporters call her landline so often Bedelia is forced to leave it off the hook. One Fredericka Lounds is especially insistent, going so far as to sneak around to the back of Bedelia’s house and tap on the French doors. She would have liked to report the nosy woman for trespassing, but that would have meant further entanglements with the police. Eventually, the reporters tire and go home, including the indefatigable Ms. Lounds, denied their precious quote from the trauma specialist who now numbers among the traumatized.

Four, five days go by and Bedelia is reading  _The Sun_  online. An article on her attack has made the front page, along with a picture of her that must have been leaked to the press. The article raises questions about the efficacy of modern pharmaceuticals in treating patients with a history of violence. One quote in particular snares her attention. “Though Dr. Du Maurier refused to comment on this article, a source close to the victim praises her therapy as “remarkable” and assures that she will be back to work once she has recovered from her injuries.”

 _Hannibal_.

*****

A week and a half following her attack a large bouquet of tigerlilies and irises arrive from Miguel Rojas’ mother. A handwritten note accompanies the flowers.

_I am so sorry for what you have suffered because of my son. If you must know, I blame myself. Many times doctors suggested institutionalization, but I selfishly did not want to listen. I so very much wanted to believe he could be cured. You and Dr. Lecter helped him more than any other doctors he had seen. You did all you could for him_

The woman’s words, her misplaced kindness, cut Bedelia somewhere deep in the vicinity of her soul. She descends into the basement and tosses the woman’s letter and her flowers into the furnace. Even as the words go up in flames she is haunted by them, Mrs. Rojas’ looping script writing itself over and over again on the backs of her eyelids. The cloying funereal smell of the flowers clings to her like perfume.

Before bed that night, Bedelia stands before the medicine cabinet in her bathroom. She eyes the slim orange bottle, counts the number of pills through the translucent plastic—there are enough. No one is here, no one would know, and not even Hannibal would come to her rescue this time. Her hand itches to unscrew the safety cap and take them all. She doesn’t.

Instead, she peels back the dressing on her neck to reveal Hannibal’s neat stitches. The skin is the tender pink of a rare steak, but otherwise healing nicely. She retrieves small blunt cuticle scissors and begins snipping away at the stitches one by one as if in a trance. When she is finished, Bedelia can see the angry red line of a wound unhealed. This pleases her.

In the morning when she wakes, Bedelia takes the bottle of sleeping pills and pours them down the garbage disposal. She has decided to live. But not in the way she did before.

*****

When she opens the door, Hannibal is giddy, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet. “How is my favorite patient getting along?” he asks warmly.

“It’s good to see you, too.” Bedelia’s mouth hovers somewhere between a smile and a frown. “I’m glad you were able to come today.” Hannibal follows her into her living room, his dark eyes taking notice of the cardboard file boxes littering the hallway. “I apologize for the clutter,” she says, taking a seat on the sofa.

Hannibal hesitates for a moment before taking a seat next to her. “Before we talk, may I inspect your wounds?”

Bedelia extends her hands and Hannibal turns them over to examine her palms. They are smooth and unblemished, completely healed.

“Very good,” he pronounces. “And your neck?”

With slight trepidation, Bedelia pulls back her hair and unbuttons the top two buttons on her blouse. Hannibal reaches out and brushes back the fabric. He flares his nostrils and gives a slight “tsk” of displeasure.

“You removed the stitches. You should have waited for me.”

She buttons her blouse and straightens her spine, forcing herself to hold his hard gaze. “I exercised my own professional judgment.”

“Such a pity. Now it will scar.” He cocks his head. “Perhaps you wish to be scarred.”

Bedelia says nothing, refusing to indulge him in his blatant attempt to psychoanalyze her.

“Many cultures practice ritual scarification to mark important rites of passage. Do you feel your attack has transformed you? Or perhaps you merely wish the world to see evidence of your suffering.”

“I’m not some adolescent case of self-harm, Hannibal. Now if you have concluded your examination, may we discuss the actual matter at hand?”

“Which is? You were very vague on the telephone.”

Bedelia smoothes her skirt, ironing out invisible wrinkles that aren’t there. “I have decided to retire from private practice. In the wake of my attack, I no longer feel I am in a place emotionally or intellectually to give my patients the care and support they deserve. I wanted you to hear it from me first.”

Whatever he thought she was going to say, it wasn’t that. Hannibal’s expression is wild with surprise. His dark eyes hold a feral desperation. “This is impossible…you can’t do this.” He gathers himself, slowly refastening his person suit. “I beg you to reconsider, not only for myself…but for the rest of your patients and the psychiatric profession. You are making a hasty decision.”

She shakes her head, a long curtain of hair flowing over her shoulder. “I’ve thought about this very carefully, Hannibal. I know my own mind…and my own limits.” She pulls out a business card. “I am happy to provide you with a referral. I believe Angela Fletcher would be a good fit for you. She has agreed to take you on.”

Hannibal takes the card, gives it the most cursory of examinations, and hands it back to her. “I do not want Dr. Fletcher or any other psychiatrist. I want you.”

It is going every bit as badly as she expected it would. Hannibal’s childhood memories of abandonment blossom across his face. She wonders if he is aware how very transparent he can be at times. “This is not easy for me, Hannibal. I value the work we have done together. I enjoy our conversations. But you of all people should understand why I no longer feel…safe…continuing my practice.”

He stands and walks over to stare out her large floor to ceiling windows. The sunlight streams behind him, making him appear like some kind of darkly beautiful fallen angel. When he turns back around, all traces of vulnerability are gone. “Dr. Du Maurier, may I speak to you for a moment as your colleague instead of your patient?”

She shifts uncomfortably in her seat. “If you feel you must.”

“Do you wish to retire because you no longer feel safe from your patients—or because you worry they are no longer safe from  _you_?”

Bedelia feels her heart start to pound within her breast. She wants to say,  _yes, yes, I broke the first and most important rule of medicine, I am no longer fit to hold the title of doctor_. She doesn’t. “More the former than the latter.”

“As a colleague who as dealt with violent patients myself from time to time, and has even had a few die in my care, I can understand how a patient’s death can make one feel like one has failed. But so often we ourselves forget that for some patients, mental illness can be terminal.”

“It doesn’t have to be. It shouldn’t be.”

Hannibal rejoins her on the sofa, leaning back casually. “When a patient dies of an inoperable brain tumor, no one blames the oncologist. Yet when someone dies in our care, so often people say that his or her psychotherapist didn’t do enough. We both know that’s not true.”

“But Miguel Rojas did not commit suicide,” she says, her voice reedy and thin.

“No,” Hannibal corrects, “but he did suffer from uncontrollable mania and paranoia and outbursts of violence. Who is to say he would not have attacked someone else or been shot by the police?” He takes her hand in his again, pats it in a comforting way. “You didn’t let Miguel Rojas take your life—why should you let him take your life’s work?”

 _Why indeed?_  Hannibal’s words slip in her psyche and awaken what is left of the rational, untraumatized part of her brain. She feels him reach inside her, thread his needle, and attempt to stitch the gossamer-thin frayed pieces of her soul together. She wonders if she should let him. “I do not think of my retirement as an end to my career. Without patients, I will have more time for my research. Hopkins has offered me a position as a visiting lecturer.”

Hannibal looks at her askance, his profile haughty and aristocratic. “Research is a poor substitute for praxis.”

“Forgive me for saying so, but you have a horse in this race.”

“I do not pretend perfect objectivity in this matter. But when you speak of your premature retirement, I hear trauma talking. Not the doctor whose counsel I have come to value so greatly.”

 _Paging Dr. Du Maurier_. Bedelia wonders if that woman, so confident, so effortlessly wise and secure, is gone for good, dead and buried along with Miguel. “There is a great deal of sense in what you say, Hannibal. I will think on it.” A light reappears in his dark eyes. “But you must prepare yourself for the possibility that you will need to find another therapist.”

Something is clicking and turning behind Hannibal’s eyes, she can nearly hear the whirs and the ticks of that marvelous machinery, like a perfect Swiss timepiece. “I shall remain cautiously optimistic for the time being.”

She stands and escorts him to the door. Before leaving he turns to her and says, “I do hope you will reconsider ending my therapy, Dr. Du Maurier. Over the years, you have helped me a great deal. Recent events have given me the opportunity to help you. We make a fine team. I would hate for our partnership to end.”

She swallows and plasters her gentlest smile on her face. His words slip in to cut her, like a fillet knife to the ribs. “I’ll be in touch.”

*****

In the hours and days that follow, Bedelia must remind herself that she has chosen to live. Live with the consequences of what she has done and live under the shadow of Hannibal’s threat. To do so, she will craft a person suit as splendid as Hannibal’s own, layers of sophistication laid on like lacquer, glossy and hard. It is surprisingly easy, and makes her wonder if it is possible to develop calluses on one’s conscience, scar tissue on the soul.

Her medicine these days comes in cork-stoppered bottles instead of plastic ones with childproof caps, in blackberry-dark pinot noir and effervescent dry prosecco instead of tasteless capsules. It’s not the kind of medicine she needs, but it’s the kind that doesn’t require a prescription. Halfway through her evening dose, she dials Hannibal on his cell phone, giving silent thanks when it turns over to voicemail.

“Since you were so insistent, I am willing to keep treating you as my patient, Hannibal. My only patient. How does next Thursday at 4:30 sound?”

**Author's Note:**

> Hannibal's words about the terminal nature of mental illness are a paraphrase from a recent article I read in The Atlantic...I can't seem to track it down. It seemed like something he might say to Bedelia to help her rationalize her actions.
> 
> Never fear, I am still hard at work on _Satisfaction_. I just needed this as a...palette cleanser.


End file.
